>> in australia, i think there is a broad and bipartisan recognition that china had undue influence in the past because what we will call the campaign finance laws would allow significant amounts of cash to go from china, and it is getting cleaned up and not to have interference in the next election. there is questions about the chinese media and other things, but it is an issue where both parties appear to be united around preserving the integrity of their own reputation and i think the system is as true in new zealand although they probably don't have an election this year. >> i want to thank you all very much and we are going to turn to even scarier stuff with bonnie s. glaser right away without a break. so you have the column and let's thank our panel for their

predictions in your prediction. [ applause ] >> we are going to move right into our security threats panel. >> we are going to move right into our security threat panel and get your clickers ready because i will briefly introduce everybody. we have a really terrific team and of course we could sort of all do some other panels as well, but these folks are

really security focus. we have to my extreme right again and no comment about you politically, but patrick buchan who went to our alliance and american leadership, and to his left is victor who is the senior advisor, and then we have gregory poling who directs our asian maritime transparency initiative and nicholas szechenyi who is the deputy director at the japan cheer and i am bonnie s. glaser and on the china power project here. we are going to start i think by looking at a slide from last year. if you can put that up. we started last year with a question of where will a major security incident most likely

occur? you may all remember and we was here in january of 2018, and we was all thinking we was going to have a crisis on the korean peninsula and we was talking about fire and fury and the potential for the u.s. using force and here we are a year later with a totally different situation on the korean and angela. the south china sea interestingly, we did have the incident at the end of the year with a chinese ship going probably about within 45 feet, but no major incident. the east china sea is really interesting at the end of the year, in december, there was actually no incursion by a chinese vessel into the 12th nautical miles around the

islands, which is sort of interesting. but we have 40 had three this month, so maybe we are headed back to where we was. of course the taiwan strait and it will be extinct to say what people say about that this year. on the indian border, we will six months, and people was worried about the potential for another incident, but then we had the meeting, and they really diffused i think that issue although of course there has been a pretty major buildup in the area since then. so that is where we was in 2018, and we are going to ask the exact same question now for 2019. these make sure that your clicker is owned and i hope you will all vote. i know there's more people in this room that is voting and we don't have the ability to actually identify what your vote is as it really is

anonymous. no great cyber capabilities here. we hope you will cast your vote and we will look at where a major security incident is most likely to occur. interesting of course as we have korea down and the south china sea up. we have the east china sea interesting and even lower than last year, but an increase in taiwan. so the south china sea seems to be the biggest concern, so why don't we start with you greg. is there a likelihood of a major security incident in the south china sea and what would trigger it? >> for me, i flip the coin in my head and picked korea. the south china sea is a perfectly reasonable choice i think. last year, a number of instances happened to indicate the weight that this year and the following year is going to

go. we had the decatur falloff and as you mentioned, the chinese response was much more aggressive and reckless than previous responses. parsley that reflects broader discontent with the way the relationship is going. i think it also reflects china's anger over the multi- lateralization that we had, the first british one that was clearly british. we had increasing activities by the french, the patient the scope of australian patrols. the japanese continue to operate, and i think china feels like they win the south china sea if they keep it as a bilateral side of the u.s. narrative. if it's an issue of china versus the international community, is harder for beijing to win. we may see more aggressive attempt to dissuade other parties from trying. the philippine review is also a potential trigger if the americans come forward with the

statement that i would say is insufficiently clear, it might very well provoke adventurism from beijing. testing: commitment. conversely, if we are all clear on the mbp scope, it dissuades china and it lays down a red line to make it clear to beijing where the trigger would be. we have to see where that will go but it is clearly an open question. we saw yet another example of china using the threat forced to force the vietnamese to cancel oil and gas drilling last year. the vietnamese are not going to take this forever. they are not buying the narrative that the code of conduct calls for israel and they don't believe china is sincere in their diplomatic outreach in the way that france and the filipinos do. there's always a potential for

a small scale is that between vietnam and china to escalate even without the u.s. lester, we had a very dangerous case of the chinese coast guard harassment and a philippine ship on which they had eight marines. we had the year before two different incidents. my prediction is, i don't know if it happens tomorrow or six months from now, but there will be a vibrant incident in the south china sea that has a potential to escalate. i just have no idea if is going to happen before december 31. >> the second is the taiwan strait and we have gone up and out to 22%. my view is, the chinese have a toolbox of ways they can put a lot of pressure on taiwan, in which they are doing. we see it diplomatically and economically. we have elections not in 2019, but in january of 2020 using

the chinese as we get closer to election, they go into a covert influential mode. there's been a lot of activity around the island, but perhaps that represents concerns about what his speech means. i will go on the record as disagreeing with most people on the implication of that speech. i do not think that china has set a deadline for unification. i think a close read of that speech which is not the the your speech, but the 40th anniversary of the message to taiwan compatriots, was basically a requirement in the speech he had to make. it was long and comprehensive, but you can count the number time that he talked about peaceful unification and it is not surprising that he would leave that use of force on the table as a possibility. but i think a close read of that speech shows how little

room he has to maneuver on taiwan. he has to shore up his flight. he can't be vulnerable to criticism domestically on taiwan. he certainly had to restate the policy and state china's determination to unify taiwan. i don't see it as urgent and i know some other people in this town do. we will move to the korean peninsula and victor, we've gone down from 42% last year and now we are at 16%. pretty significant drop. do you agree? >> it's interesting that the south china sea went up 27 points and korea went down by just about the same amount. so everybody who voted for korea last year is now voted for the south china sea. i think it's hard to say. is this a reflection of the

fact that people think diplomacy is succeeding with north korea? or, is it a relative thing, relative to the south china sea? it looks like there is more potential activity there. i think that reflects a general view among all of you that when there's positive talk about diplomacy and the leaders themselves have committed to a diplomatic process, that gives people some sense of confidence that this thing will not erupt into a crisis. i would remind everybody that is north korea. today, everything could be peaceful, but at the second summit doesn't work out, there's a lot of pressure on the second summit to produce something tangible this time and not just a statement of principle.

this is the danger of negotiating at the summit level because if you don't achieve what you want to achieve, by definition, the negotiation has failed because there is no place else to go. in that sense, i understand that the audience is reflecting what they see as a positive statement from the leadership. there has been no tangible change in the security situation on the ground. there is still some activity to maintaining bases, but that's okay. i'm happy to see the south china sea win this year. >> looking in the east china sea, we will probably have a summit between prime minister abbi, and thus the improvement in the japan and china relations make a security incident in the east china sea less likely? >> thanks bonnie. that's probably true in the near term. you are dimension the operational tempo in the east

china sea has decreased of late, and that probably speaks to the desire for bilateral diplomacy this year. at the same time as mentioned previously, japan is fundamentally concerned about china's long-term military ambitions. in mid december, they released a new defense strategy and a five-year procurement plan focused on defending japanese territory in the southwest island chain. there is still concern about china's long-term ambitions. you will see japan continue to invest in defense capabilities, strengthening the alliance with the u.s., and partnership with others in the region. but i can understand why this question only garnered 2% in the near term. hopefully, the relative stability in the japan anti--- china ties of late will reduce the likelihood of an incident

in the near term. >> if there was to be an incident would be controllable given how potentially volatile that relationship is in the very strong nationalistic feelings on both sides and the history. >> i think there is a growing concern about the digital for axonal escalation. on the other hand, the bilateral diplomacy that we saw last year produce some progress in developing hotlines between japan and china to prevent accidental conflict. i think the chances of avoiding such a circumstance have improved. is still a very volatile situation and one that needs to be watched closely. >> looking at this from the perspective of australia, what is australia most worried about on that particular set of issues? is it the south china sea or something else? what is australia think is the

most likely security incident that could involve potentially australia, either politically or potentially militarily? >> when i would sit on the doom and gloom panel, i was a bit upset. i'm an optimist. i wonder if we have a bit of a false positive year and some of these answers because i think the world has had enough drama for the past two years, i think we will enter a phase where we will see things calm down a little bit in the region. i think from the australian point of view and is being in the united states for almost 5 years, so i am not as palladian as i once was. the colleagues that i speak to, i think you would see if we had an australian audience here, would probably go for south china sea. obviously for them, is the most geographically close in terms

of proximity, but also in terms of the australian critical reliance of it trade flows going to that area. also the unequivocal answer we haven't got, is where does the treaty sit regarding the south china sea? diplomats and legal scholars, there still a lot of vague wording around that, and were thus the australian obligation on the south china sea sit? i recall back in 2005-2006, a difference between the foreign minister and the prime minister on that one. for the australian officials and the public at large, i think beijing would be the largest concern at this stage. >> just like in a simulation, there's no fighting the scenario or challenging the question. let's go to the next slide and

we are going to dig into career. as you know president donald trump just met with kim jong un , and a terrific photo of him sitting in the oval office at his desk and the array of people opposite him. now, we appear to be moving towards a second summit although you will see in this one, and there is still a possibility the second summit will not take place and you can certainly choose that. the question, and we will focus on, what could a summit produce? we all know what came out of singapore. really interesting to see that people here are so pessimistic that is going to be nothing. no tangible progress with 80%. we have a very small percentage of people that think we are going to get something positive out of it. we have about 9%, and that would be an agreement to end

the korean war. we have about the same percentage for the promise to withdraw u.s. troops, have north korea provide a list of its components of his nuclear program. or else the second summit will not take place. i'm guessing victor, you don't disagree with this too much. first, and >> first, the audience went down 26 points in terms of seeing this at the security crisis yet, at the same time, they don't think nothing is going to be accomplished in the summit that will take place. that's interesting. an agreement to end the korean war, not likely. promised to withdraw u.s. troops, not likely as a specific result of the summit. as my colleague said earlier, is not out of the realm of possibility given the views of this president on u.s. troops

abroad. list of verifiable components, that would be a great outcome. that would be the first tangible step towards a real denuclearization process. it would be an inventory of all of their capabilities set that you could locate and verify them, and begin a negotiation process on disablement and dismantlement along a specified time line. that would be the best outcome. for that reason, it is very unlikely it will happen. i don't know if i'd agreed that there would be nothing or no tangible progress. as i said before, there's a lot of pressure on both leaders to come up with something tangible this time that goes beyond the statement of principles that came out of singapore you have to remember that's a lot of fanfare around the statement, and seven months of nothing, no progress at all.

at the working level, because in part, the north koreans don't want to negotiate at the working level because it is harder to negotiate with people who know about the issue than it is to negotiate with the got the top who doesn't know anything about the issue. or maybe not anything, but is not as well entrenched in the negotiation. i think was likely to come out is something tangible that is a piecemeal step forward, probably involving the original nuclear facility in return for what the north koreans really want most now, which is not a piece declaration. what they really want is a relief from sanctions pressure. whether that comes from that united states, the un, or through the south koreans, through exemptions for south korean projects. i think something along those lines is going to be more likely the outcome.

it has to be something the president can defend as being a positive step forward. for the north koreans, it has to be enough so they can claim they are getting some sanction relief. a second summit will not take place, i say that maybe it will not take place, but it could be delayed. we have seen this happen before. there's a lot of repositioning that takes place. we do have six weeks before the approximate time of this meeting. that does lend to more negotiations both over substance and logistics than we had prior to singapore. but both of these leaders are famously fickle. they could change their mind and decide to delay or postpone. i think it will happen. was the best outcome from the south korean perspective? i think the optimal outcome would be some tangible step going forward that all sides

can point to as achieving their objective. the satisfying outcome is that it would not be a failure so the process would continue. they have a big stake in the continuation of diplomacy because largely in 2017, they was led to believe the alternative was something worse. the potential miscalculation or the potential of war. i think their best outcome would be some increments of progress where everyone could say this process is alive and producing results. short of that, anything that allows them to say the process is not thriving, but it has a pulse. a heartbeat. >> i think from china's perspective, incremental progress is good. they want the dialogue to continue. they don't want everything to

fall apart and they don't want any major breakthrough either. we have one more slide on north korea, if we could go to that. so, now we really are going to do and glenn. if nuclear negotiations between the u.s. and north korea fail, what is going to happen? please don't forget to turn on your clicker again and please vote. we have resuming missile nuclear test, and the agreement is for that freeze. that would mean that the u.s. and south korea would resume exercises. the second choice is focused on rhetoric. not really so much actions, but that there would be tightened provocations, that that would be a rhetorical response and c is engagement will just continue.

e is that china and russia redouble efforts to prop up north korea. maybe not completely mutually exclusive, but what do you think is most likely to happen? keep registering your votes. people are pretty spread out, but a lot of optimism that inter-korean engagement will continue. i think i agreed that we will probably see a resumption of nuclear missile test and military exercises. again, may not be mutually exclusive. victor, what do you think? >> i think if you take a, b, and c together, that represents almost 91% of the audience. i think that combination is right.

first, it depends on how you define failure. if you define failure as both sides walk away from the meeting say this really sucked, and it was really a bad meeting, and we don't see future progress as possible. if we use that definition of failure, then i think again, if we combine what all of you have said about a, b, c, that looks like the likely outcome. the south korean government is committed to engagement, not just because ideologically they believe in it. they have now tied their own domestic economic solution to the difficulties, low growth, and higher employment to inter-korean economic engagement. they don't want to go back to 2017, the year when they thought there could be war. for that reason, i think they will continue to focus on engagement even if the u.s. diplomacy is failing.

i think again if we use the definition of failure being both sides walk away and say there's nothing here anymore, i think we will go back to some of the missile testing. the u.s. will probably reengage, and then we will have a lot of name calling back and forth. the interesting thing about everything that president donald trump has done on north korea is he has gone out of his way not to criticize north korean leaders in almost every tweet and everything he says, he has been very careful not to criticize, and only flatter the north korean leaders. failure would probably mean all that gets dropped and all of a sudden, he becomes rocket man again. and he is no longer sort of the dear leader. >> we have to remember that's been true that presidential is always praised him except for

that one time, would like maybe he is not my friend anymore, and he went back to being good friends. you never know, that he could flip. nick, what are the implications for japan at the talks fail? >> going back to the previous slide i think people in japan would be comforted by that voting in this audience about the prospect of u.s. troop withdrawal from the korean peninsula because u.s. fort presence on the korean peninsula is critical for japan's national security, in terms of deterrence. certainly would want to see that. i think japan's primary concern is to encourage more progress on the denuclearization front. victor made reference to the potential for south korea to talk about sanctions relief. i think japan is fundamentally committed to trying to maintain

sanctions on north korea. with the un, absence of any evidence of change in his behavior, and from the japanese perspective, support for this process, desire for concrete objectives and some results to denuclearization. then, on the backend, in terms of sequencing, a willingness on the part of japan to have a new relationship with north korea. the instinct is to maintain pressure. in this case obviously if north korea resumes nuclear test, japan is on the front lines of that threat. i think, perhaps, that could actually prompt a change in dynamics in u.s. and japan

relations and the ties right now are quite strained, including between the two militaries. perhaps that would encourage more trilateral coordination in response to that threat. i think japan's instinct will be to coordinate more closely with washington. as a matter of strategic necessity, south korea should be returned to a more provocative environment. >> let me add to a comment that nick made about a trilateral relationship. i completely agree that it is terribly strained, and we are at the point that we are hoping a crisis with north korea is going to be away that we have to get trilateral and bilateral relationships back on track, that's really a reflection of how bad the situation is. we don't focus on it as much as we should because we largely

think of it in the context of coordinating on north korea. but the u.s. administration they are not only doing this bilaterally, they are doing it from leader to leader. we don't really feel the cost of missing that trilateral coordination where if anything that we tried to implement are due in agreement would require cooperation between japan and south korea. i'm extremely worried about the state of this relationship right now. there's really no sign, the usual indicators you would see, that none of these is present right now. this is very bad. >> very good point and on the china peace year, i was say that china has tried to walk this very fine line and keep in the north korean issue as a positive issue and that they can use it to get any leverage on our trade, which president donald trump with out the first

year in office, or probably have evaporated from a point of view. there are not that many very positive issues in the bilateral relationship that the two are working on together. north korea is still pretty much on the positive side of the ledger, but at the same time, china and russia have been pushing to get the sanctions east. that we will be interested to see if the nuclear negotiations fail, that puts more pressure on china on how they are going to play this issue with their relationship with the u.s. and whether or not it works more closely with russia. that would be challenging. so we are going to move to our next slide and spend a little bit more time on this one because is a lot to dig into here. the biggest boon to security in the indo pacific during 2019 will turn out to be, and we have five really good choices here. all of which would be good. the question is what's going to be the most important one that is going to strengthen security

? you actually have to pick the one that you think is going to happen, and if it is going to be most important to strengthen security in the region. let's see where we are. we have closer u.s. and japan defense ties in the lead and people are not too optimistic about the reaffirmation of the u.s. alliance commitment. we will talk more about the quad , and nobody thinks that china is pulling back on their activity in cyberspace. we will talk more about the code of conduct in china in the south sea with the discussions that are going on. so it looks like that the closer that the u.s. and japan

defense ties is first. nick, why don't you leaders are. is that the right choice? >> absolutely. i think it reflects a lot of development in security cooperation between that u.s. and japan in the recent months. just getting to the question and the boon to the security in the indo pacific, there's a lot of discussion in washington and tokyo about what free and open indo pacific means. and whether or not the u.s. and japan aligned in terms of that strategy, and we can debate that going forward. i think fundamentally that concept is a framework that will facilitate more defense cooperation between the u.s. and japan and other like-minded countries and partners in the region. as i mentioned earlier, japan had the new defense strategy

with three basic themes. strengthen their own capability, shrink the the us- japan alliance, and partner with others. this very much closely aligned with the national security and defense strategy unveiled by the trump adminstration. i think there's a good framework in place, and what will we see in the coming year? i think there's a lot of dialogue on cooperation and new domain space in cyber. i think we will see more exercise these and -- exercises, a big thing we are working on is alliance interoperability. the more reliant we are as allies, the more effect if the alliance will be at the compelling signal throughout the region. does a lot of positive momentum there and potentially some friction on trade bilaterally which may be addressed in the upcoming panel.

perhaps a mixed bag for the u.s. and japan this year, but i think the side of greatest momentum is on the defense ties. >> that's a good lead in to you pat and last panel, we talked a little bit about the quad and whether or not it will be focused on trade facilitation. should the security and infrastructure and a lot of people chose all three. probably very optimistic. what you think? what role is the quad going to play? >> i was surprised in the first panel we had and i thought it would be higher on the trade in particular on the infrastructure side, and we had a real uptake on the security side. is quite an american concept to push very hard on that and on the military side of things. i'm very gratified and i was surprised, and i was very keen

to see what the numbers are going to be. to come out number 2, i lost my scholarly independence when it comes to the quad and i am now a believer. the way that i think we get there is not a top-down approach. as you think about the successful alliances we have got here, and we think about the successful alliances we sing, it's a bottom-up approach. is all wed -- welding good for the heads of government and foreign minister to sit around and had these grand strategic discussions with each other. but the best way to get there is at the service level. is working together. i think you find these things bubble up. on the things like integration interoperability, my colleague nick mentioned that we are doing a lot of that and we are asking panels about what are those things in the alliances, particularly at the trilateral level?

what are the things where we can get our services to work? in the american domain, things like a common platform that everyone is now using. i think it is no secret that my colleague, rick and i, we have a lot of discussions about how does india come on board, and most importantly, what's in it for india to come on board? one of the problems you have, and we all know that the legacy, and what is really strategically in the interest of india and going to something like this. but a major problem you have is the interoperability. india traditionally have the mixed bag about where there weapon systems come from. obviously russia has been a significant exporter of military elements and military systems to india.

that's naturally a problem just at the tactical level for integration. i must say i am gratified with that and a lot of people when i tell him the quad, the place where i work on, i sort of always get a good luck with that made. but this gives me some hope for myself and my team to keep going. i think just at the product level to know about, is if there are indian officials in the room are those who have context, let's try to push malabar to move from a three nation activity to a four nation activity. i think as i've said before, the source of concepts and alliances and whatever you want to call them, coalitions, they do start at that service practical level where we can build up from there rather than a top-down approach. >> coming in a close third at 21%, we have diplomatic

progress between china and south asian countries on the south china sea. there's a three-year timeframe for finishing the coc. so, 2019, not a lot of urgency. we've seen a single draft, and that was written about first by carl thayer, and it is been asserted in the draft by some of the players. maybe you can talk about what are the prospects for really significant progress being made and what are the main issues that the countries disagree on? >> i'm rarely called an optimist around town, and this makes me feel even more pessimistic than usual. i'm shocked to see 21% of the audience. if there was diplomatic progress, that would be an enormous boon. i just don't see much prospect of it. the timetable for china

is now three years at best. just last week, we had the latest meeting of the regular vietnam meeting on border affairs, and the prime minister was obviously upset because afterwards he went to the press and said he's frustrated by the slow pace of the diplomatic process of the coc from the chinese side. there are a lot of poison pills inserted into the text not just by china, and there is a lot by china and there is clear nonstarters to see what they are going to get away with. there are things about fishing that will not flight with china. the vietnamese was so cynical about the process they basically stapled their own code of conduct to the back and said none of this will work and here is ours. they have talked about maybe 50% of the easiest issues.

they haven't been discussions about the hard core of the problem, like where is dakota conduct going to apply geographically? how do you operationalize cooperation on things like fisheries? where they'll be settlements and if there are disputes? if the last 10% of any negotiation is the toughest, they still have 40% to go before they get to the last 10%. the countries that are going to be pushing it that you don't give me a lot of faith. tiling is now the chair and they will be distracted again by a delayed elections. i think they want to get out of this thing and they are not going to be proactive in pushing the south china sea or anything else. the philippines is the coordinator and they have been relatively ineffective in reading china's willingness to negotiate. they told us there was going to be a code of conduct profit in 2017.

they said maybe they will get a deal, but none of that has been true. the bilateral diplomatic processes offer a little more optimism, but again, not much. on the oil and gas i, you had an agreement last november to continue to negotiate on oil and gas. the philippines and china set up a one-year timeframe on that. by november of this year, they hope to have some kind of agreement. again, it's unclear they are even talking about the same thing. if the chinese are actually willing to accept the philippine principal, which is that chinese companies have to invest in oil and gas operations under the appeal and pay taxes due the philippines, and recognize the philip things that make philippines right to be on the shelf, then awesome.

but i don't think so i think in november that will be delayed again. then you had the oil and gas agreement we had an agreement to declare a decade of marine protection to the south china sea. they pledged to fall that with concrete negotiations and we are over a year later and as far as i know there is not been any concrete negotiations. it runs into the same problems. i don't have a lot of faith and if there's going to be a crack, i suspect it will be on marine environmental protections. >> last but not least, is the reaffirmation of the u.s. alliance commitments to the philippines and south korea. greg has just co-authored a terrific piece on this issue, which i command here. so quickly greg, what you think of the prospects from your perspective of the u.s. making a reaffirmation? >> this is my choice and i'm doing a terrible job of

guessing where the audience is going to go, and largely because of the negative consequences. if we don't do this on both sides, the consequences are far worse than on the other four. i do think it is likelier than not that we do see an affirmation that the mutual defense treaty applies in certain cases to the south china sea. a lot of the devils will be in that, and i think u.s. is not going to recognize philippine sovereignty over the nine features that the philippines currently occupied. we will see where that goes, but i do think it is likely that we do reaffirm the position that it -- been secretary of defense william:enforced in 1990, which is an attack on philippine armed forces, public vessels are planed anywhere in the pacific includes the south china sea. if that doesn't happen, there are only two possibilities. one, the philippines new wall.

they decide the tree does them no good. i think they are dead serious about that, with good reason. it will not consummate much of the u.s. thinks it will. philippines gets thing that is special is a guarantee against external attack. we do all of that with indonesia, malaysia ifand vietn. the only thing the philippines gets that special is a guarantee against external attack and if we don't offer that what's the point? that will prompt them to seek a better deal. he can sell the alliance and convince the chinese he's serious. turnaround the americans are there and that's extremely negative for the security . >> what about our alliance with south korea? >> i don't know where the audience is answering, or if it's what they want to have and

, i think career was the outlier in terms of the allied that would be the most problematic. we are in the situation where the key elements of the alliance under negotiation and things like sma, the cost sharing agreement that expired december 31 last year, january whatever it is, 23rd and there still is no agreement on how to divide the cost of u.s. forces. there are a variety of things that need to be negotiated between the two countries if there negotiated to a mutually satisfactory satisfaction that would be great but if it doesn't then, the alliance will be on rocky waters for this year . >> we are going to move to our last question before we turn to the q&a from the audience. the polast question is which

current or potential location for chinese port is the most concerning? the presence of several other countries and the united states, let me tell you where else we might see chinese basis that we could be evolving. they could start with logistic facilities, but the chinese increasingly talk amongst themselves about to have these kinds of facilities, not necessarily using the term basis but they call them logistics facilities. we are looking at about 50% saying pakistan there is potential in cambodia and

there's a lot of discussion in the south pacific and another potential is there's no need to be concerned and the question is, where will we see basis. so, we don't have any south asia expert >> i can promise if you ask this question in new zealand or australia, you will get rapidly different figures. you know, i don't think there's

any great secret that china and pakistan have a long-held relationship, i don't think there is anything particularly new and not. i'm not convinced, given the current operations that it willb give them, if this did occur, any great extra ability to operate, considering they always have operations in that region anyway. so i don't say this is an australian official but i say it's the interesting one because you reaching out attention the, the new areas for up ration for the navy. it's pushing out further away from the chinese mainland and potentially cuts them strategically between new zealand and the united states. , but it doesn't surprise me, it's not one i would be overly surprised or shocked that in terms of this .

should we be worried? >> yes but not as worried as we could be. we already see vessels taking calls and ntusing facilities . >> the big concern is where the chinese have casinos and things and deep water ports and have begun expansions on an airstrip, the cambodians have strenuously denied a chinese base in cambodia. vice president pence delivered a warning clearly to the cambodians in asia last year, but the cambodians often deny a

lot of things that happen. if there's any place in southeast asia where you could imagine a chinese presence in the future, which is why i didn't pick this but in the future, it's cambodia. all of the concern about that in the philippines or in indonesia, i find those to be overblown and increasingly unlike given domestic politics. i can imagine this but i can imagine rotational chinese access for certain things considering the serve will is relatively small. the chinese don't have to worry about e public pressure, they only have to buy off the leadership that's not the case either in other authoritarian countries in southeast asia . >> we have eight or nine minutes left and we will take questions from the audience. please wait for the microphone, state your name and affiliation and make a short question so we can try to collect a few. let's go over here in the front .

>> i have question, can you share, the many ways, is there any connection between them and denuclearization ? >> will you repeat the question? >> what came out of this with president trump? >> let's collect three questions . >> next, here in front . >> wait for the microphone, thank you .

>> i'm currently visiting how does that all of this flow into the middle east? >> then over here, we have, microphone is on its way. thank you . >> i'm affiliated with the voice of america and his the question, thank you for bringing up the coc. we've heard this announced that they plan to achieve this in three years and we've also heard the complaint about slow progress, so i'm wondering whether it's feasible the announcement on china. there is risk management and israel on harassment and compensation and we can expect sustainable fees

when this is achieved. . ank you >> okay, start with the , you want to make headlines? >> you've already made the headline because the result of the meeting was they announced a summit. generally you think life becomes and meets with tom pao in the counterparts, that can be part of a negotiation. the call on the president was to deliver a letter or response from the north korean leader to president trump. there's probably another beautifully written love letter that the president fell in love with. but, again, i think where we brare now is that we have so of set it date towards the end of february we have six weeks butta logistics have to be planned, six weeks, if were taking bets, vietnam is the

place to do it because logistically it works for both, hawaii, frankly was not work for the north koreans that well because they don't have much infrastructure. but, we have six weeks now not just to plan logistics but for the counterpart and for others, to try to negotiate again, what will hopefully be tangible outcomes from the summit meeting. if the summit does not result in steps towards knee new irritation it will be declared a failure, everyone will take garrett a failure. so it wouldn't surprise me if there was postponement. if there's stnot enough progres to me, the situation that's most concerning is like red said earlier and if we get to the point and the president says i will wing it from here, that is the most dangerous scenario this is literally

rocket science. it's difficult stuff that you can't wing it . >> on the middle east question we don't have middle east expert appears so i don't know if anyone wants to comment. >> if we go back to just under the obama administration, the whole idea was to prevent somewhat away from the middle east, those of us, who work on a shan indo pacific, think this is a critical area .of the worl we should pay attention to whether or not we as a nation can successfully nevitt away from the middle east, were pulling troops out of syria but to me it's still a work in progress. if we look at where we put the resources there's a lot of other places we are not putting them and many would like more resources in asia although this

is a step in that direction. does anyone want to add anything else ? >> i would just say, briefly, in the context of the debate about u.s. strategy in asia and free and open and of itcivic vision, it really comes down to a transition in u.s. strategy from a focus on responding icto terrorism which is overwhelmingly the post 9/11 focus to now, overwhelmingly the notion of strategic competition with china and russia and the importance of u.s. alliances in asia in that context. whether the current focus on asia leads to less tension in the middle east or a renewed focus on u.s. presence around the world to maintain a stable international order, it's

probably an open question but i think the focus on asia is not necessarily just regional. i think it has potential to open larger questions about the u.s. role in the world and the allies and partners in asia, talk is much about that as they on in the ch about that as they region . >> >> on the code of conduct, i don't see any evidence that any side, china or vietnam were to agree the other claimants are conceding on a code of conduct in this year or 2021. that could change but it would require a change in strategy among many parties. the only way beijing will decide to verify the line and the scope and to make the concessions required to reach a fair deal, is going to be if there's an awful lot of

international pressure that convinces china that it undermines the act woody globally. it makes and undermines the idea it's a responsible rising power that deserves a seed in global rulemaking. that's not happening. that came off the table and this administration's decision to focus almost exclusively on north korea and trade issues . >>, much greater focus whether or not china is willing to reach a deal now, yeah, i think beijing this serious. of

inevitable u.s. retreat from the reason. and that china's victory in the south china sea is inevitable. so they up to get on board. dutertevinced rodrigo of that and they think they can convince others. despite all of the nice rhetoric about negotiations, we had a very rapid military buildup. deployments of anti-ship missiles and advanced jammers. 24/7 rotational presence of navy and coast guard ships throughout the south china sea. we have 24/7 rotational presence of navy and coast guard ship to the size of the maritime militia this increased considerably. these are not the actions of a country whose only willing to

negotiate, it's the actions of the country prepared for negotiations . >> this is been a terrific panel. we will take a 10 minute break and have coffee, please come back we will save the best for alaska will talk about a trade war and a trade deal and other questions leading to economics, please join me in thanking our panel. [ applause ]